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| Gems and Jewelry |
Moral Origins
Jill Newman
04/01/2004
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The Rand diamond, introduced three years
ago, is his company’s first branded venture. Each diamond is cut by a
proprietary method called Zero Tolerance, which positions the facets to provide
maximum brilliance, Cohen explains. Each stone is polished for optimum beauty
rather than to preserve its carat weight, so that a 20-carat rough stone will
typically result in a 3- to 5-carat polished diamond, he adds.
Each Rand
diamond is sold with an individualized provenance report, which serves as its
birth certificate, outlining its unique characteristics, including a serial
number that is laser-inscribed on the stone’s girdle. Using their diamond’s
serial number, customers can sign on to the company’s website, www.randbrand.com, and view pictures of the
stones they have bought being cut and polished by the company’s
craftsmen.
Even the diamond heavyweight DeBeers is beginning to market
diamonds directly to consumers under its own name. DeBeers opened its first
store in London in 2002, a second in Tokyo in 2003, and it plans to open shops
in New York and Beverly Hills within the next two years.
While the untrained
eye would likely be hard-pressed to tell the difference between a Rand or
DeBeers signature diamond, the notion of a powerhouse brand behind the stone
undoubtedly gives consumers added confidence when making such a sizeable
emotional and financial investment.
Others are following suit. The British
diamond merchant Graff, which has been trading in large rocks for more than 30
years, recently opened a salon in Palm Beach and is close to finishing an
elaborate boutique in Chicago. International diamond trader Rosy Blue introduced
its first branded collection, Rosiblu, and the Vera Wang jewelry collection in
partnership with the high-profile designer.
Another emerging diamond brand is
Vivid, a decade-old jewelry company that gets its cache of exceptional stones
from Lev Leviev, who is a partner in Vivid and who is also the owner of LLD
Diamonds, the largest producer of polished diamonds in the world, with mines in
Russia and Angola. When Vivid opens its first boutique on Madison Avenue later
this year, it expects its stock of important diamonds will outshine any
competitor, says its CEO, Alexis Sarkissian.
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